A Tiger at the James Farm, 1972

Our family has some slides labelled "James Farm 1972." Here's a scan of one of those slides, in which we see a tiger behind some chain-link fencing. A Google search using various combinations of "James Farm," "zoo," "animals," and "Canada" produced no results that seem to match.

Does anyone out there remember a "James Farm" that put exotic animals on display in the early 1970s? I don't believe this was Al Oeming's Alberta Game Farm; I have slides of that, too, and it doesn't look like the same place.

Poor sad tiger. 

An Alberta Legend Passes On

CBC reports that Al Oeming, he of the Alberta Game Farm, died earlier this week. Zoos get a bad rap these days and I'm not well-informed enough to debate their merits, but as I wrote in one of this blog's most popular posts, the Alberta Game Farm left quite an impression on me. It was quite a thrill when just a couple of weeks ago Al's son Todd commented on that post, outlining some of his plans for the site; you can see what the younger Oeming is up to at www.wildsplendor.com. I'm sure Todd will build a legacy his father would be proud of. 

Brother of Another Colour

Al Oeming's snow leopard in a more natural hue.

After yesterday's lament about faded old slides, Jeff sent me a helpful email about Photoshop's amazing curves function. A few simple adjustments, and this poor old snow leopard is no longer looking quite so pink.

 Here's another scan of an old slide. This is my Uncle Arnold and a couple of my cousins, sometime back in the late 60s. The photo is awfully pink, so I'm going to follow Jeff's advice and use the curves tool to flush some of the red out.

Well, it's not perfect, but I think it looks a lot more natural than when I started. Thankfully the vast majority of the hundreds of slides I've scanned don't exhibit this extreme red tint. In fact, the only ones that have turned red are all of a strange non-standard variety; the film frame is much larger than a normal 35 mm slide, with a very narrow border.

CORRECTION: Mom tells me that this photo is probably not from the late 60s, but rather 1959 or 1960. Whoops! Thanks, Mom.

Al Oeming's Alberta Game Farm

A snow leopard interred at the Alberta Game Farm, circa 1974.

Back in 1974, while we were still living in Leaf Rapids, Mom and Dad took me on a trip to Alberta, where we visited Al Oeming's Alberta Game Farm. I don't remember the trip at all, but while scanning the family slide collection today I came across some official photos created by the Farm for visitors. The slides are in very rough shape, the colours faded by the years to a dark pink. I've tried to colour-correct these as best I can, but the results, as you can see, are lukewarm at best. (UPDATE: originally these photos were very pink, but thanks to a tip from my friend Jeff, they now look much better.)

Mom and Dad inform me that we did visit the Farm once again after moving to Alberta, mostly so that my brother Sean could see it. I have hazy memories of this trip - really nothing more than sensory impressions of strong odours, chain-link fences, and perhaps a sea of cars in a field that served as a parking lot, though this could easily be a memory conflated with that of one of our trips to the Namao air shows.

In its later years the Alberta Game Farm was known as Polar Park before shutting down for good in 1998. The Edmonton Journal has a pretty funny gallery here; my favourite is the one captioned "In 1978, gorilla escapes were a problem."


Here are a few other slides:

Formosan Sika Deer

A pair of Nilgai

Chilean Flamingos

A chained cheetah